Review

by Carl Kimlinger, May 23rd 2011

Hanasaku Iroha

Episodes 1-7 Streaming

Synopsis:

Life with her irresponsible mother is comfortable enough for teenaged Ohana. Sure she has to do all the cooking and cleaning and her allowance is crap, but she has her friends and her routines and a general sense of security. Which turns out to be mistaken. Drama-loving Ohana is about to get a bellyful of the real thing. First her mother's equally irresponsible beau gets in deep with the wrong kind of lenders, necessitating a quick escape, and then Ohana is informed that instead of going on the run (dramatic!) she'll be remanded to the custody of the grandmother she's never met. Ohana is excited at first, but her granny quickly disowns her—the blood of her wayward daughter is no blood of hers—and puts her to work at her traditional inn. Where fellow workers alternately abuse (temperamental cook's assistant Minko), patronize (assistant cook Tohru), or ignore her (timid fellow waitress Nako; basically everyone else). Not what Ohana had in mind. She's a strong girl, though, and circumstances can only keep her down for so long.

Review:

Synopsis:

Life with her irresponsible mother is comfortable enough for teenaged Ohana. Sure she has to do all the cooking and cleaning and her allowance is crap, but she has her friends and her routines and a general sense of security. Which turns out to be mistaken. Drama-loving Ohana is about to get a bellyful of the real thing. First her mother's equally irresponsible beau gets in deep with the wrong kind of lenders, necessitating a quick escape, and then Ohana is informed that instead of going on the run (dramatic!) she'll be remanded to the custody of the grandmother she's never met. Ohana is excited at first, but her granny quickly disowns her—the blood of her wayward daughter is no blood of hers—and puts her to work at her traditional inn. Where fellow workers alternately abuse (temperamental cook's assistant Minko), patronize (assistant cook Tohru), or ignore her (timid fellow waitress Nako; basically everyone else). Not what Ohana had in mind. She's a strong girl, though, and circumstances can only keep her down for so long.

Review:

Hanasaku Iroha is a straight-up youth drama: no super powers, no supernatural forces, no ninjas, no fights with the fate of the world at stake—just a girl trying to make her way in a new and hostile environment armed only with her determination to change for the better.

That may sound bright, but to begin with it's actually pretty grim going; mainly because the cast is seemingly composed of total jerks. The inn's staff is uniformly disagreeable: Minko is a witch, Tohru is a dick, Nako is a doormat, and Ohana's grandmother is a special kind of monster, an unyielding, intolerant old bat with the kindness and warmth of a crowbar to the head. Their treatment of Ohana is callous and unfair (she's beaten for inconveniencing a guest) and worse yet, thoroughly unrealistic. Even bad people would treat Ohana better than the staff does, if only because they want to keep up appearances. At times like that, normally you'd look to the main character for someone to identify with, but no: Ohana is insensitive to point of social debilitation (her inability to read others is a super power unto itself) and spends far too much time whining and wallowing in self-pity to be sympathetic. And without anyone to empathize with, the inn-based unpleasantness is just that: unpleasant.

Episode two proceeds in a similar vein, but just as it seems that the series' attraction will be confined to its attractive presentation, things change. The inn staff begins revealing both their better sides and the reasons for their less happy quirks, but that isn't it. There was never really any doubt that Ohana would begin ferreting out the truth about the various staff members and perhaps even influence them—that's just par for a youth drama of this stripe. No, it's Ohana who gives the series a boot in the right direction. Rather than continuing to play the victim, she reaches down inside and lays her hands on a surprising store of inner strength. She takes the fight to Minko and Nako, taking them to task while vowing to do her darnedest to acknowledge and correct her own shortcomings as well. She begins to look on her new life not as a burden but as an opportunity to improve herself.

It sounds corny as heck when put like that, but it really works. The series almost immediately takes on a brighter, more optimistic feel, and Ohana finally becomes that focus of sympathy that we were flailing about for just the previous episode. Ohana's earnest desire to grow, to "shine" as she puts it later, quickly establishes itself as the emotional heart of the series, adding punch to the fluffy stories and a sense of purpose to the darker ones. That it transforms her into one of the sunniest, strongest young heroines out there is pure gravy.

The episodes that follow aren't necessarily any more realistic than the first. There's a wannabe tortured author who kidnaps Ohana and practices S&M rope-knotting on her before fleeing in despair and trying to commit suicide because...well, because that's what tortured artists are supposed to do, right? A later episode features a group of survival gamers who in any sane world would have long ago wound up in the slammer or the asylum. Along the way there're some predictable romantic complications and a marketing consultant who drives an expensive sports car despite sucking so bad at her job that there's no way she could afford one.

They're all fairly serious breaches for a show that generally aims to be a calmer, more realistic alternative to your average explosions-and-boobs teen anime. They're funny breaches, though—something that would have been unthinkable based only on the first episode—usually because of the cheerful sangfroid with which Ohana deals with them. Even by episode three she's so many miles beyond her poor-me former self that she actually helps the author when he messes up his bondage knots, and when the management consultant wants her and Nako to cosplay (the better to lure in the male clientele) she doesn't just take it in stride, she embraces it with an enthusiasm that worries her co-workers. There's something both uplifting and a little surreal about Ohana's newfound and unnaturally even keel, which makes her an endlessly interesting lead.

There are times, however, particularly when things get really odd, that a little of the opening episodes' darkness would be welcome. Even so, the new tone a vast improvement, and the series never completely abandons its serious undertones—particularly where Minko is concerned. Plus there are plenty of unaddressed issues waiting in the wings to blacken the series' mood, primary among them Ohana's relationships with her sociopathically irresponsible mother and emotionally closed grandmother.

And barring all that, the series' look still lends it enough visual realism that it never feels entirely cartoony—even when it most definitely is. Masahiro Ando and the crew at P.A. Works paint Ohana's story with a palette the stays strictly within real-world boundaries and surround her with backgrounds that bring real life, particularly to her grandmother's austere yet lived-in inn, but also to her new school, the glittering metropolis of Tokyo, busses, trains, and the beautiful country town the inn occupies. Mel Kishida and Kanami Sekiguchi's character designs avoid funky hair and funky colors, remaining suitably attractive while being subdued enough to be called realistic. Ohana naturally hogs the series' cuteness, hoarding enough to destroy a platoon of moe clones.

P.A. Works' animation is nice-looking, always there to do what it's supposed to and never bad enough to get in the way, but excellent only in short showy bursts. Shiroh Hamaguchi's score is of similar quality, though it is far more seldom used. Indeed, just plain seldom used. It is best when simple and sensitive. The opening and ending themes are appropriately pretty numbers that grow considerably on you.

There will undoubtedly be some who aren't interested in what is essentially a throwback to an extinct age of wholesome entertainment. Their loss. Hanasaku Iroha is a sweet and surprisingly fun throwback, an alternately funny and touching tale of growing up that's just a few lapses in realism and a couple of missing punches to the heart away from the best of its type. And it still has plenty of time to catch up with them.

Grade:

Production Info:

Overall (sub) : B

Story : B-

Animation : B

Art : B+

Music : B

+ Sweet without being saccharine, uplifting without being corny—as solid a coming-of-age-tale as you could want; looks good; great lead.− Rocky dramatic start, followed by a few too many standalone tales of inn eccentrics.

Wow! Hundreds of millions of dollars are flowing into the anime industry thanks to streaming! Is any of that money going to the people who actually make anime? Justin gets into it.― Custom Gundam asked: With ANN recently reporting that Crunchyroll royalties to the Japanese industry exceed US $100 million and also the huge amount recieved from global companies like Netflix and Amazon and also the va...

Take a journey back in time with Daryl Surat, when many people were introduced to anime through heartwarming films like My Neighbor Totoro and Grave of the Fireflies. But what forgotten gems lie sleeping in this long-ago year?― Every so often, I get questions regarding what the value is in observing what works of popular culture remain worth watching, decades after their creation. But nearly three m...

This beloved 2000s megahit is the newest to get a live-action update to the big screen, now available on Netflix after its theatrical run in Japan. Theron Martin finds out if this movie can live up to fans' expectations.― Fullmetal Alchemist was one of the most popular and successful anime/manga franchises of the 2000s, so the only surprise surrounding this live-action adaptation might be that it di...

Citrus has turned a few heads with its incestuous twist on lesbian romance. We suss out whether this makes for a juicy love story or just sour pulp.― Citrus has turned a few heads with its incestuous twist on lesbian romance. This week in anime, Michelle and Steve suss out whether this makes for a juicy love story or just sour pulp. Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by the participants in...

Hiromu Arakawa's pastoral drama about the highs and lows of farm living at an agricultural college is a far cry from Fullmetal Alchemist, but just as rewarding. Rebecca Silverman has the details.― Hiromu Arakawa's agricultural coming of age tale's anime adaptation reached English-speakers long before now, which makes it feel like a real treat to finally get the chance to read the manga. Based roughl...

Paul discovers a hidden gem in a surprisingly lazy package with this lovely slice-of-life comedy. Plus, all this week's new anime releases and a brand-new Shelf Obsessed!― I've been working on putting together a Star Wars model kit recently, and holy heck that process is easier if you have a decent set of the appropriate tools. It's almost a relaxing experience when you don't have to threaten each ...

This attempt at a gritty action spectacle falls prey to confusing storytelling and baffling editing. Theron Martin examines what went wrong.― In the Summer 2016 Preview Guide, I gave the first episode of this manga adaptation a middling score, saying that it isn't without potential. Rarely have I looked back at a review and been more perplexed at what I wrote, as on a second view that first episode ...

There sure are a lot of gambling anime, but what's it actually like to gamble in Japan? Does anime paint an accurate picture? Justin gets into it.― Jake asked: I have recently been watching Kakegurui Compulsive Gambler on Netflix and it has me curious about gambling in Japan. Gambling is in a ton of anime from Samurai Champloo to Kaiji. Mostly I am familiar with the basic odd even dice game as well...

Mike digs into the legendary and idiosyncratic career of Ryousuke Takahashi, from Cyborg 009 to Armored Trooper Votoms to Phoenix.― A few weeks back, the Right Stuf folks were running some sort of cheap-o blowout sale, and one of the items for sale, along with a still-absurdly-large quantity of Geneon and ADV Films DVD backstock, was this hat. Yep, for just one dollar, you could be the proud owner o...

This adaptation makes great use of its difficult source material to tell a trapped-in-a-game/escape room story worth digging into. Rebecca Silverman explains why.― If you've played the original game of Ao Oni (“blue demon”) or watched the series of anime shorts, Kenji Kuroda's novelization may come as a surprise. That's not a bad thing, though – Kuroda's reimagining of the source material not only c...